Starting our homeschool adventure!

I was really torn on what to do with schooling this year.  Technically, Kameron wouldn't start Kindergarten until Fall of 2014, but I really believed he was ready.  I went back and forth trying to decide if I should do preschool with both boys, or go ahead with Kindergarten for Kameron and do more preschool aged things for Brenner.  So I decided to go ahead and try him starting Kindergarten, and then if I felt like it was too advanced for him, we'd cut back and go at a slower pace. 

 

I am SO glad I went ahead with it!  I found an awesome curriculum to use and purchased their Kindergarten pack.  Kameron is excelling with it and we do a lot of it with Brenner too. 

 

For the first "day of school", I surprised with the boys with chocolate covered donut holes for breakfast.  They were beyond excited and it set a good tone for our first day.  Travis also left us a note, which was a great surprise.  I'm so thankful for a husband that is so supportive and excited about this journey.  

 

So with this currciculum, we do history, bible reading, a rhyme with hand motions, science, dramatic play activities, bible memorization, devotions, music, art, math, reading comprehension, phonics, handwriting and a thinking skills book.  We don't do all of these every single day, some rotate around and some we do every day.  I have been surprised at how much Brenner has loved doing with us and it SO fun to watch them learn together! 

Within a week, Kameron was reading!  I had tried teaching him to read a while back, and now realize he just wasn't ready.  His reading lesson book is one of our favorite things to do together.

We make sure to leave lots of time for playing!  Our "schoolwork" doesn't take more than 60-90 minutes, which I scatter all throughout the day. 

I try to leave one or two things from our lesson plan for the day for when Travis is home.  It's nice for the boys to get to learn from dad, do fun activities with him, and then Travis gets to see a little bit of what they are learning. 

Kameron still has to do his eye patch for 4 hours a day, which he usually does while working on the tablet.  The boys LOVE to snuggle and do the tablet together.  I feel like in the last month since we've started school, they have become so close, are getting along so well and just really enjoying being together.  It's been really good bonding time for our family.

This was the boys making boats out of foil and then finding how much they could hold in the water without sinking. 

We have finished up 2 full weeks of school now and I am thrilled with how it's going.  We are loving the curriculum and it has been so much fun to do it all together.  I was really nervous about if I would actually be able to pull this off with my 3 little men, but it has been so much easier than I thought it would be!  I do some with all 3 boys, some with Kameron while the younger 2 are sleeping, and some we do when Trav is home as a family.  It has given great structure to our day and I am blown away every single day with how much they understand and the conversations we have!